PARIS, July 17 (Reuters) - Air France on Thursday it had decided to avoid east Ukrainian air space after a Malaysia Airlines flight crashed in a field in Ukraine near the Russian border.

An adviser to the Ukrainian interior ministry said all the 280 passengers and 15 crew members onboard died. The Boeing 777 jet was en route to Kuala Lumpur from Amsterdam.

"Air France is monitoring the situation in real time and decided to no longer fly over eastern Ukraine after it was informed of this incident," a spokesman for Air France said. (Reporting by Elizabeth Pineau, editing by Leigh Thomas)